That Bloody Shard

Has a walk through central London yesterday, and walked past The Shard. This building has annoyed me from it’s outset; as far as I’m concerned, London shouldn’t be a city of skyscrapers. New York exists already.

Still, it’s pretty hard not to be impressed by The Shard when you’re confronted by the immensity of it up close. Even so, I haven’t warmed to it. You can see it looming from pretty much anywhere in London, and I hate that. It simply spoils the view.

They seem to be knocking things down all over London at the moment, replacing everything with glass and shiny white slabs. As far as I’m concerned, they’re robbing London of it’s character. People come to London because there’s history here in it’s streets – you can feel it as you walk around.

I like London to be grimy, seedy and old.

My grandad was a builder and he laid some cobbled pavement at the Elephant & Castle, donkey’s years ago. They ripped those up recently, and it looks really mundane now.

I was glad when the protesters started smashing things in London the other day; not because I agree with their plight (I don’t); nor because I’m an anarchist – but simply because I hate what London is becoming.